Petroleum industry

On January 30, 2013, the court (Rechtbank) in the Hague, The Netherlands, ruled that Royal Dutch Shell can be held partially responsible for pollution in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region and ordered it to pay damages to one farmer. The Dutch court dismissed four out of five allegations of the Ogoni people against the oil company. Although Shell blames the oil pollution to sabotage, activists say the case could set a precedent for damage claims related to the foreign activities of multinational companies.

Tensions between Argentina and the United Kingdom over the Falkland Islands came to a boiling point when the UK announced plans to begin offshore oil drilling near the remote islands in February 2010. This blog will briefly discuss this complicated dispute as well as the actions taken by both parties in the United Nations General Assembly.

On Monday, 8 June Royal Dutch Shell, Europe’s largest oil producer, reached a 15.5 million dollar settlement in a lawsuit brought against it by the families of the nine Nigerian activists who were killed in 1995. The lawsuit, which was brought to a New York court under the US Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA), accused Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary of complicity in the hanging and the killings or persecution of the environmental activists.

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Permanent Court of Arbitration

The Permanent Court of Arbitration is an intergovernmental organization with 116 member states. Established in 1899 to facilitate arbitration and other forms of dispute resolution between states, the PCA has developed into a modern, multi-faceted arbitral institution that is now perfectly situated at the juncture between public and private international law to meet the rapidly evolving dispute resolution needs of the international community. Today the PCA provides services for the resolution of disputes involving various combinations of states, state entities, intergovernmental organizations, and private parties. The PCA’s Secretariat, the International Bureau, headed by its Secretary-General, provides administrative support to tribunals and commissions.